Go with your gut

May 20, 2014
- by
Dan Malovany

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Selling a company isn’t as easy as you think. At least, that’s what Fady Hayek found out when his family put PBF Pita Bread Factory up for sale last year.

“It was a longer, more involved process than I thought it would be,” said the president of the Burnaby, B.C.-based bakery located just outside Vancouver. “I’m not trying to scare anybody off, but always expect it to be more complicated than you anticipate. The best thing is to hire a merger-and-acquisition specialist company. Let the professionals do the work.”

Working with KPMG, Mr. Hayek, along with his two younger brothers, crunched numbers and put all of the data together for more than a dozen potential suitors. In the end, PBF chose Chicago-based Arbor Investments, a private equity firm whose portfolio includes other mid-sized bakeries such as Gold Standard Baking, Chicago.

Obviously, not all marriages work out, and in business, partnerships involving private equity firms don’t last forever. However, Mr. Hayek and his brothers feel by going with their gut, they made the right decision. They got to sell the company and bought a little time. For now, they feel blessed to be able to still work together.

Check out the May issue of Baking & Snack for the full story on this burgeoning bakery.

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